O’Neil’s Three Things: Seahawks are consistent in their inconsistency

Nothing about these Seahawks is consistent.

Not even their offensive ineptitude.

We learned that on Saturday against Arizona. Just about the time we were going to write the team off after another gutterball of a first half, the Seahawks came out in the second half and while they didn’t quite totally redeem themselves, they were surprisingly competent in the third quarter and downright explosive for the final 4 minutes of the game.

And while that may be the loss that costs them a first-round bye in the playoffs, it also offered a ray of hope that this team may not be entirely beyond repair.

Three things we learned:

The absence of Earl Thomas was evident against Arizona. First, the bad news: Carson Palmer’s 80-yard touchdown pass to J.J. Nelson in the second quarter was the longest pass play the Seahawks had given up since Andre Rison had an 80-yard catch against them in 1998. That was so long ago, it’s tough to remember who Rison was playing for. (It was the Chiefs. Yes. Rison played for them, too). Nelson scored on a post route, which puts the onus squarely on free safety Steven Terrell, who was responsible for the deep middle on that play. He can’t let anyone behind him. Thomas is the guy Seattle counts on to keep the barn door shut on that play, and perhaps the best news for the Seahawks on Saturday was that Thomas stated on his Twitter account that he will definitely come back to play next season.

The Seahawks have been unbelievably unlucky at running back. In the past two seasons, Seattle’s running backs have suffered, in order: 1) a sports hernia requiring surgery (Marshawn Lynch); 2) a broken ankle that included torn ligaments (Thomas Rawls); 3) a broken bone in the hand (C.J. Prosise); 4) a hairline fracture in the leg (Rawls, again); 5) a broken scapula (Prosise, again). Then Rawls left Sunday’s game with a bruised shoulder. We haven’t even gotten into the soft-tissue injuries, which there have been plenty of, too. It’s absolutely unbelievable and the sheer volume of injuries makes it tough to blame the Seahawks for not having sufficient depth.

Seattle’s entire place-kicking process is jacked up. Stephen Hauschka had one answer after Saturday’s game: “I’ve got to do better.” He repeated that statement to any question whether it was regarding the 45-yard field-goal attempt that was blocked in the first half to the point-after conversion that missed left at the end of the fourth quarter. The blocked field goal was due to a low trajectory on the kick. The missed PAT was affected by a high snap. It all adds up to a place-kicking operation that is entirely out of whack to the point that Seattle has missed more extra-point attempts (five) than field-goal attempts (four).

Three things we’re still trying to figure out:

What happened to Seattle’s offensive line in the second half? We know what happened in the first half. The Seahawks went out and laid the kind of egg we’ve seen before. Like in Week 2 at Los Angeles. Or last month in Tampa Bay. Seattle allowed five sacks in the first half against Arizona in addition to running two plays that lost yardage. In a half in which Seattle ran 34 plays, that means that on one in five they essentially lit themselves on fire and ran around. It wasn’t an offense Seattle was running so much as a debacle, and it was underscored by the fourth-down play from the Arizona 1 in the second quarter when Seattle’s line opted not to block a defensive tackle, who hit Russell Wilson before he’d even fully turned around after faking a handoff. But we’ve seen that kind of a performance before. What we haven’t seen is that group getting it together like it did in the second half and suddenly looking like a competent, downright professional offensive line. How exactly do we see more of that going forward?

Why has Seattle stopped going to Jimmy Graham? This was supposed to be a solved problem. Graham was targeted eight or more times in five of the six games the Seahawks played starting with Week 3 vs. San Francisco and through the Monday night game against Buffalo in Week 9. He had more than 100 yards receiving in three of those games. He has only been targeted eight times or more in one of the team’s past seven games, a fact that is fairly impossible to justify when you consider that Wilson’s passer rating this season when he throws to Graham is 118.5 compared to 87 for all other receivers.

What will Tyler Lockett’s leg injury mean to his career? It was the single biggest bummer from a game that included lots of them. Everyone saw what happened to his lower right leg when the Cardinals cornerback came down on it. Well, everyone who didn’t have the good sense to turn away before the television broadcast started replaying it. (Note to FOX: the first replay that shows a limb appearing to be boneless as it flops under the weight of a player should be the ONLY replay that is shown of that limb appearing to be boneless.) The question of how Seattle copes with the loss in terms of personnel is pretty straightforward as Jermaine Kearse will slide back into the starting role and Paul Richardson will get more opportunities. The bigger question will be the timeline for Lockett’s recovery and how it will affect him. On a team full of strong and at times difficult personalities, Lockett is universally beloved, which doesn’t mean it’s any easier to see someone else suffer an injury like that, but I think it’s unanimous that everyone is wishing the absolute best for him.

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